How two former Broadway producers created an app that solves the biggest annoyance with buying theater tickets

Walking past Times Square, it's almost impossible to miss the
winding lines of people waiting to purchase Broadway tickets.

It's an odd sight to behold in the age of the internet and
smartphones, and it speaks volumes about how trapped in time much
of the theater industry is.

Two former Broadway producers, Brian Fenty and Merritt Baer,
took notice of the theater industry's overall lack of innovation
when it came to ticketing.

Both men had a background in finance in addition to their work
producing, so they decided to combine the two and create TodayTix, an app that lets
you purchase theater tickets at the absolute lowest cost.

"We thought about how we wanted to sell tickets and the most cost
effective way to sell tickets, and then as theater lovers, how
would we want to buy tickets — what's the easiest way to see a
show?" Baer told Business Insider. "The industry generally made
it harder to buy tickets. Our philosophy was the exact opposite:
make it as easy as possible to get tickets into the hands of
consumers, and in doing so, broaden the scope, availability, and
access to theater events."

Of course, competition already exists in the mobile ticketing
space from big players like Ticket Master and StubHub, but mobile
tickets still don't exist within the theater industry itself due
to union restrictions. So regardless of how you purchase a
theater ticket, you'll need to pick up or print out that ticket
beforehand, which is the key area TodayTix wants to differentiate
itself by creating a VIP-like experience where your tickets are
already waiting for you at the theater in the hand of a smiling
concierge.

With TodayTix, that means offering a service that's lucrative to
both theater fans and Broadway producers, with the goal of
disproving the idea that a night at the theater is always an
unaffordable luxury.

"Most
people think, and we’ve done focus groups, most people assume
that Broadway tickets are $100 to $150," Baer said. "But the fact
is if you look on the app, a vast majority of shows have tickets
in the 30, 35, 40 dollar region."

TodayTix

When you open up TodayTix, you're greeted with a screen full of
theater artwork and showtimes. The app offers tickets for all
Broadway shows, and a selection of the most popular off-Broadway
shows. Tickets are only available seven days in advance, and
there's also a Mobile Lottery feature that lets people enter a
random drawing to purchase tickets for extremely popular shows.

"Our app
is 30 seconds or less to buy a ticket, and it's something we
really stuck to," Brian Fenty told Business Insider.

Once you order your tickets, you don't have to do anything but
show up at the theater a few minutes before the show starts. When
you get there, just look for the concierge wearing a red TodayTix
shirt, and you'll be handed your tickets. And since the TodayTix
concierge team is made up of aspiring actors, you'll also have
someone to answer any questions you have if it's your first time.

"We're trying to make the delivery a high end experience as
well," Fenty said. "We like to say it’s a high-touch end to a
high-tech process."

TodayTix

Fenty and Baer understand the business side of Broadway from the
larger context of having grown up acting.

"Merritt
and I met 18 years ago at theater camp," Fenty told Business
Insider.

"Actually
videos do exist, and I have one on DVD," Fenty
said. "But
what’s interesting is that camp has yielded some of the
industry’s biggest producers, biggest stars, biggest songwriters,
so it’s really this amazing melting pot."

The two drifted apart after camp and eventually went to college,
with Fenty attending The University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill and Baer attending Stanford University. Both Fenty and
Baer entered into the world of finance, but their love of theater
eventually prompted them to begin looking at Broadway from an
investment standpoint, even after they each began their
respective careers in private equity and investment banking.

In 2010, Baer produced The
Merchant of Venice starring Al Pacino, and then went on to
produce Death of a Salesman in 2012, for which he won a Tony
Award. Fenty was also producing Broadway shows at 23, and the two
eventually re-connected while Baer was working in London.

TodayTix

"It was around that same time period that Brian and I reconnected
and said ‘Hey how do we take my background in ticketing and both
our backgrounds in producing and Brian’s entrepreneurship, how do
we apply that to the theater industry?" Baer said. "And all this
with a background of the theater industry in 2013 where in,
according to The Broadway League, .08% of Broadway tickets were
sold over mobile."

The two set out to change this, and they have.

"We launched in December 2013, and we currently are selling
roughly 3 percent of all the tickets on Broadway," Fenty said.

With their knowledge of the industry, the two have also forged a
partnership with The Public Theater in New York, an off-Broadway
theater that now exclusively offers the first public showing of
their plays through TodayTix, which offers a free lottery for the
first preview shows.

It's been a successful partnership. When free tickets for the
first preview of Julie Taymor's one-woman show "Grounded"
starring Anne Hathaway were offered on the app, over 15,000
people entered for the chance to win tickets.

A year and a half after launching, TodayTix has raised
$6.7 million in two rounds of funding, and on Monday they
announced they were expanding their market to London — a market
where TodayTix can introduce e-tickets for the first time since
there's no restrictions like in the US.

And the business is clearly growing — In the first third of this
year alone, Baer says the company's downloads have increased by
53% over the entire history of the company. Repeat customers are
responsible for 55% of TodayTix's transactions, too.

But it doesn't come easily. Fenty says it takes time to build the
necessary relationships, and having 20 years of experience in the
theater industry helps them succeed where others have
failed.

"We spent most of our lives in this world, so we really know the
inner workings, and there are other companies that have dipped
their toes into the Broadway waters, and have been quickly
discouraged and left the market," he said. "It’s also about
having a customer base that’s growing and trusts
you. Knowing it’s best price, and knowing you’re a company
that’s saving customers millions of dollars, that helps."